


I'll never get out (of this world alive)

by MathildaHilda



Category: The Last of Us
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Character Study, Father-Daughter Relationship, Implied/Referenced Suicide attempt, POV Second Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-10
Updated: 2019-04-10
Packaged: 2020-01-10 21:57:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,069
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18416645
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MathildaHilda/pseuds/MathildaHilda
Summary: "You fire the gun, because to hell with the world. You fire the gun, and you don’t look back."





	I'll never get out (of this world alive)

**Author's Note:**

> Title from; I'll Never Get Out of This World Alive - Hank Williams

Take the girl and run. Take your daughter and run.

 

_(Sarah, Ellie. Sarah, Ellie._

_Ellie, Sarah.)_

 

You run, and you don’t look back.

Don’t you fucking dare look back. Because then you might decide that the other option was the better one.

 

(It never is.

Sometimes, it always is.)

 

So, you don’t look back.

You fire the gun, because to hell with the world. You fire the gun, and you don’t look back.

 

(How many times can you spin the chamber until you land on the right one?

Even if it’s never the right one. But it never is, is it?

It’s always the wrong one, no matter how hard you spin or how many times you stop, how many times you cock the hammer or point the barrel.

Spin it round and round, spin it exactly like those merry-go-rounds Sarah always liked when she was little.

When she was little, and the world had yet to go to hell.)

 

The first time you shot a Runner, you thought you were going to throw up. Yeah, maybe you’d been an idiot and an asshole at some point in your life, but never, _never_ had you had the desire to shoot someone.

Maybe in the foot or the knee, but that’s not really the same as shooting someone in the head, is it?

In this new world it might be, because shooting someone in the foot is like leaving them for the Clickers and the Runners and all that bullshit that come after that point of this crazy fucking world.

You never dare admit it; but it did get easier. The killing, the stealing, the lying.

You figure people see it, so why say it out loud?

It got easier to bury what you were and dig up another version. Another version of yourself that never flinches and only grits its teeth and dig fingers into mud and blood and cracked skin.

You never dare admit it, not to Tommy or to Ellie. Not even to yourself.  _Especially not_ to yourself.

You’d rather live with what you became, rather than what you once were.

Because death got easier, and living got harder.

Got too easy, and too hard.

 

You didn’t go looking for Ava after the outbreak.

She lived in the city, just like the Coopers, so you didn’t go looking. You hadn’t had any kind of contact since she’d up and left Sarah in your arms with little to no money whatsoever, but she was still Sarah’s mother. Still the woman you figured you had once loved.

You didn’t go looking because you didn’t care; you didn’t go looking simply because you couldn’t see a scenario where it would make any kind of difference.

You didn’t go looking, because pretending is better than reality and your caring nature seemed to have died with Sarah in the dirt on the side of a road meant for salvation.

 

(How deep can you cut before the blood dries on your fingers and paints your teeth a crimson red?

How deep can you cut, before you drop?)

 

Sarah left, but not by choice.

Tommy left, and that was all on him.

And for the first time in forever, you’re alone. Well, maybe not really; but it’s pretty damn close.

 

(How many beats does your heart have to beat before it finally stops? Before it’s you and Sarah again, kicking soccer balls and playing those video games that you seemed to be so bad at?

How many more beats until it’s the last gift you can give Ellie before the cordyceps, one day, takes you too?)

 

Bill had once called you inseparable; you and Tess.

Tess had called him pathetic and he’d refused your services for a week before Tess came up with something that could be taken as an apology and then the name calling had begun again.

You never met Frank, but you kinda wished you had. Maybe then you’d been able to understand Bill just that little bit more.

Maybe then no one would’ve been called pathetic over the way they decided over chess moves and took one another’s king in less than ten strokes, cheating or not.

You weren’t friends. Friends didn’t seem to be a thing at the end of the world; survival of the fittest and fuck everyone else.

You weren’t friends; you and Tess and Bill. But you were close enough. Sometimes it seemed you were, at least.

And now both Tess and Frank are gone, and you have a kid on your hands that seems immune to everything but the uncommon cold, something she caught on your way to Tommy’s, just because she decided that being stubborn was better than being dead.

 

Grief does strange things to you. It does strange things to everyone.

Sarah buried you with herself; swallowed what you once had called your own humanity and given you back to the living with something feral and cold.

Ellie dug it right back up and shoved it back into your face, showed you were to polish and where to spit; where the grease belonged and where the brass could be screwed.

Sarah buried you with herself; and you figure, sometimes at least, that maybe she buried Tommy with herself as well. He’s not the same, but neither are you.

You’re brothers and brothers aren’t meant to be alike. But they’re meant to be more alike than this. At least to you, they are. But you figure not everyone kills in cold blood just because the payment got long overdue or saw a bite and held a gun ready in their hand even if it was just a dog’s teeth and not the brand of a walking fungus’.

 

(How long can you hold your breath before the air runs out?

How high can you count before you let the water in?

Just long enough that you know that you can’t die just yet.)

 

Fireflies are supposed to be small, stupid things with light bulbs for asses. Not literal asses with guns and loud voices and bombs hidden in the bumpers of military vans.

Fireflies are supposed to be harmless, pretty things that glow in the dark. Not things that take apart a girl’s brain, even if it is to save the rest of the world.

But you’d rather it die than lose anyone else.

Let the world die. Let everything die.

Just let her live.

**Author's Note:**

> In an optional dialogue with Ellie when you're hiding from the Hunters in Pittsburgh, you can find a couple in a bathtub who have commited suicide. Ellie comments to it as "the easy way out", with Joel replying "Trust me, it ain't easy."
> 
> Even if it's never stated if Joel was suicidal or if he knew someone who was, this thing was born out of that one conversation between Joel and Ellie


End file.
